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Subject:Re: Japanese tech communicators From:Robert Plamondon <robert -at- PLAMONDON -dot- COM> Date:Sat, 11 Mar 1995 13:32:31 PST
>> On the other hand, many technical BOOKS from Japan are extremely clear
>> and well-written, even after mediocre translation.
>How can you tell the translation is mediocre? Maybe the books are
>actually mediocre, and the translation is what makes them seem clear
>and well-written.
In other words:
* Maybe the translator went out and gathered up tremendously
compelling true stories to hammer home the main points.
* Maybe the translator organized the material into a cohesive
whole, with recurring themes and a gradual development.
* Maybe the translator devised a clear, cohesive plan of attack,
reducing the apparently impossible problem of factory modernization
into a series of intuitively correct steps.
I rather doubt it, though. In real books there is enough actual
content to tell if an actual author ever gave thought to the
subject matter. While I admit that certain authors are better
in translation than in English -- James Fenimore Cooper is the
traditional example -- a "translator" who delivers a work with
significantly more content than he started with is doing something
other than translation.
